


Ghosts (Of Regret and Otherwise)

by Goodluckdetective (scorpiontales)



Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Role Reversal, Angst, M/M, Past Character Death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-06
Updated: 2016-09-18
Packaged: 2018-08-13 08:10:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,792
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7968985
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/scorpiontales/pseuds/Goodluckdetective
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Dealing with ghosts is never easy.</p><p>or Gabriel Reyes is the Ex-Overwatch Agent turned vigilante. Jack Morrison is the hero who died so many years ago come back to life.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired by the wonderful piece of art: http://sessomesmaru.tumblr.com/post/149976890670/you-tell-me-gabriel-im-garbage-stream

Gabriel Reyes could remember the exact day Jake Morrison died down to the last detail.

He could remember the mission, the rare team up between Overwatch and Blackwatch, the dirt under his boots that reminded him of his strike team days, because before they were Commander Morrison and Commander Reyes. He could remember the gunfire in the air as the weaved their way through attacking omnics, the smoke in his lungs, the worry for his men as bullets seemed to rain down almost from the sky. He could remember working back to back with Jack, like the old days seven years ago, the resentment that pooled in his gut from working with the poster boy, the man who’d left him behind to trudge in the mud that was Blackwatch.

He remembered the gun shot that rang through the air as Jack Morrison had pushed his thankless ass out of the way.

He died quick. Even almost two decades later, Gabriel didn’t know if that was a mercy or not, the fact Jack had drowned in his own blood. Some nights he still woke up with the feeling of Jack shaking in his arms, the sensation of a hang tangled in his collar, clinging to this life. He was sure he’d remember the way Jack looked as Gabriel whispered apologizes for the rest of his life, apologized for being a stubborn ass, blue eyes too dazed to tell Gabriel if he heard a single word. 

The UN would state Jack had died a heroes death. Gabriel knew better; Jack had died like everyone else on the field. Confused, bloody and in pain.

That memory, the memory of a death he was sure he’d never forgive himself for haunted him, haunted him through his promotion to Commander of Overwatch, haunted him through corruption and the scandals, haunted him when the whole thing has come crashing down in the Swiss HQ, Talon bombs rocking the place he’d once called home. Even on the run, putting on a mask as Reaper, a vigilante, Jack seemed to haunt him around every corner, a ghost of regret.

That’s all Gabriel thought he’d ever be. A ghost of regret and memory. The idea of him ever being something more literal had never even crossed his mind. He wasn’t superstitious. Dead man didn’t walk.

Except Jack Morrison did. He walked, and he shot, and he’d saved Gabriel’s fool ass in a cloud of black smoke.

He looked older, Gabriel thought from the other side of the square he was standing in, their vanquished enemies lying in the center. His blonde hair was now grey, his skin was now covered in wrinkles, his statue, while as proud as ever, had a tiredness Gabriel had never seen on the man. For years, Gabriel wondered what he would have looked like if he’d gotten to reach this age, a subject of conversation him and the others only approached when terribly drunk. Never had the picture they’d come up with looked so defeated.

They hadn’t pictured to black smoke either that rose from Jack like waves. The missing side of his jaw, revealing the bone underneath, a twisted look behind his once flawless skin. The black pit that was now his left eye, a red dot staring out from it. A monster to most who would have seen him.

Gabriel was not most people. He didn’t see the smoke, the bone, the red pupil. 

He saw Jack.

“Jack?” He said, taking a step forward. His Owl mask, his disguise, was in his left hand, long forgotten. He could blow his cover here if anyone saw him, a part of his mind whispered. To his surprise, he found he didn’t care. “You’re….you’re….what the hell happened to you?”

Jack was still. Stilled than Gabriel ever remembered him being. Jack Morrison had been a man of action, after all. He’s always been the man who’d waited in the shadows. After a moment, he spoke, his voice raspy. 

“Just tell me something. Was it worth it?”

Gabriel stared. “What?”

“Overwatch. Commanding it. Was it worth it?”

Gabriel’s mouth went dry and he closed his eyes. At the time, he’d thought it so, Jack Morrison’s goody two shoes persona finally put to rest for better leadership. A man who’d betrayed him for proper procedure, and appearance over results, over saving their men. He’d hated him. Hated him for betraying everything they’d ever promised to one another, hated himself for still caring about him, for crying at his funeral. It was only once Overwatch was in his hands that the hatred had faded, the realization that the UN controlled Jack’s every move bringing to light the orders he once thought a deepest betrayal. They’d given him every order he’d laid down, they’d told him that there was “acceptable losses”, that Gabriel had to be brought in line. Jack had served as their mouthpiece, the threat of his men’s safety, of keeping Overwatch running, of keeping Gabriel in charge of Blackwatch, keeping him in place.

After learning that, after serving as the poster boy himself from some years, Gabriel had stopped hating Jack and started hating himself.

“I-” Gabriel said, opening his eyes. There was no one to speak to. Jack was gone, not even a trace of black smoke to prove he’d been there at all. Gabriel looked down at his mask, at the Owl there. Rested his forehead against the front of it, like him and Jack used to do to each other when they were boys who thought they’d die before they hit 40.

“It never was.” He said to the white plaster. “It never could be.”

The blank gaze of the owl started back at him.


	2. Chapter 2

**CROSSROADS**

 

Gabriel finds Jack months again after recall. 

 

Or to be more accurate, what Jack has become. 

 

He doesn’t expect the recall, not really. He thought Overwatch was done with, gone and buried like it was supposed to be. When the Recall comes in, Winston’s voice ringing over the com, he spends almost a month considering if he should join them or not. The last time he ran Overwatch, it shattered into pieces under his watch.

 

Overwatch isn’t his creature now. Nor is it Morrison’s. It’s a joint effort now, the combined efforts of those who wish to make the world a better place. And with that thought in mind, Gabriel ends up at Overwatch’s door, Reaper mask in hand, telling Winston that no, he’s not a ghost, and yes, it’s cold out here so if they could let him inside-

 

(When McCree sees him, he punches him right in the jaw before promptly sobbing into his jacket. Gabriel lets the punch go, patting the kid who is a kid no longer on the forehead. He faked his death, after all. A little punching was to be expected.)

 

When Winston tells him about an attack on the center, he isn’t surprised. Of course Talon is still gunning for them, of course they still want revenge. It is only when Winston tells Gabriel of a creature made of ghost and smoke, that Gabriel freezes in place.

 

_ Jack. _

 

He doesn’t tell the others, even though he knows it’s a mistake. Letting the others know who the ghost really is, he thinks, might be enough to break the fledgling organization at this point. So he holds it close to his chest, tells only Ana when she appears, and thinks. Makes charts tracking the other man’s movements, what he might be up to, how he could have become this way. His own private investigation.

 

He makes little progress. When he meets Jack in the field months later on one of the newly reformed Overwatch missions, the man pays him almost no mind, instead focused on ruining them all. The one time Gabriel manages to corner him, he only says one thing to him before vanishing, a ghost once more. 

 

_ “Do you really think you won’t fail them again?” _

 

“I have no fucking idea,” Gabriel says to himself hours later, stowed away in his quarters. He closes his eyes and thinks of Morrison dying in his arms, Amari coming in reported dead, the ash floating away from the place he once called home, and lets off a long sigh. Ana was right, he thinks. Old soldiers never do rest. 

 

Apparently even the dead ones. 

That night he dreams of Jack, the Jack he lost, not the phantom he sees on the battlefield now. The Jack who was his friend once, before things went bad, before he grew resentful. He reaches forward to pull Gabriel in a hug, the kind they used to share when the battle was done, and Gabriel lets himself smile.

 

“We did it. We made it,” Dream Jack says. “That was close.” He pulls away from Gabriel and grins. It’s a perfect memory of the conclusion to a fight Gabriel can’t name. 

 

“Wouldn’t have been if you’d watch your damn six-” Gabriel says. Dream Jack rolls his eyes and grins. It’s his real grin, not the one Jack will later show during press conferences and on posters. 

 

“That’s what I got you for. And since I got your second, I think we’re even.”

 

“My second was not open.”

 

“Of course it wasn’t, Gabe.”

 

Gabriel laughs. It’s a good memory, this dream, of a time before shit went bad. He pulls Jack in for another hug, and forgets the world outside his memories for the world of his memories, which while troubled, was far better to him. It’s a good world. It doesn’t last.

 

The smell of smoke fills his nose. Gabriel looks down and finds the the Jack he knew, the Jack with blue eyes and blond hair, is gone for the phantom. White hair. One red eye. A jaw of bone. When he looks at him, his gaze isn’t impassive like it normally is, instead terribly pained. Like it was when he died and Gabriel could only watch. Tears come from his eyes.

 

“It hurts so much.” He reached forward to wrap his arms around Gabriel’s torso. Like he did when they were training to be super soldiers and sometimes the drugs made them feel nothing but pain. “Gabe-”

 

Gabriel takes a deep breath. He wipes the tears from the ghost’s eyes, ignoring the black smoke. He rests his other hand on the back of Dream Jack’s neck and threads his fingers through his white hair.

 

“I’m sorry, Jack,” he says, voice low. “I’m sorry.” Then, with conviction. “I’ll fix this, I promise.”

 

Dream Jack looks back up at him, and slips through his fingers like smoke. 

  
When Gabriel wakes up, he looks down at his hands and for a second swears he can see smoke run through his fingertips.


End file.
